There’s a particular rhythm to walking to work in New York—steel scaffolding overhead, the impatient shuffle of feet, the tight lane between parked cars and whatever the city is building (or rebuilding) this week. You learn the seams in the sidewalk. You learn the timing of the crosswalks. You learn to keep moving.
But lately, that familiar route feels like it’s been quietly rewired.
In this photo, the street is exactly what it has always been: a long corridor of scaffolding, a muted afternoon light, a few people ahead disappearing into the grid. And then there’s the interruption—an impossible, cartoon-bright Pokémon dropped into the real world like a daydream you can’t blink away.
It’s strange how quickly you accept it. The city has always been layered: old brick beside glass, history beside hurry, private thoughts beside public noise. Now there’s another layer, one that invites you to look down at the same pavement you’ve crossed a hundred times and feel, for a second, a little curiosity stirring.
Walking to work in NYC will never be the same—not because the streets changed, but because our attention did. The commute becomes a small hunt, the ordinary turns slightly mysterious, and the path you could walk half-asleep asks you to see it again.
